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Millions of pounds worth of stock was lost in the fire, with many of the 400 Dingles staff returning days later to clean up the mess, and construction workers began a round-the-clock rebuilding programme costing £20 million.

Peter Fairweather, from Saltash, was store manager at the time of the fire.

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In 2005, he recalled being called to the store at about 10.30pm and told The Herald: "I went into the back of the building with the firemen. From the ground floor you could not sense there was a problem. But at 11pm I went into Armada Way and was devastated to see the scale of the fire."

Firefighters tackling the blaze at Dingles on December 19, 1988

Mr Fairweather, who went on to mange the Dingles store in Exeter, said investigations revealed the cause of the blaze was an incendiary device left in dress fabrics.

He said salvaged stock was sold off from a base in Estover during January 1989, and the store traded from a shop in Colin Campbell Court until the upper two of its five trading floors could open.

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The fire made international headlines, he said, adding: "People still ask me about it today. Dingles was a symbol of the regeneration of Plymouth after the war and it had a place in people's hearts. To see it go up in flames was gut-wrenching for them."

The store re-opened its two bottom floors on March 31, 1989. The store was fully re-opened in September, 1990.